David Baldacci - The Forgotten

“I guess that’s the most likely answer. Diego was following them. Maybe they spotted him and Isabel and Mateo were with him.” Puller felt sudden guilt for involving Diego in this.

“Unless the two guys are lying dead at the Plaza.”

“Still could have been them. Diego and his cousins might have escaped from them.”

“After killing the two guys?” Carson said skeptically.

Puller looked at the woman again. “Lo siento. Podemos ayudar de alguna manera?”

The woman shook her head and told Puller that only God could help her now. She shut the door and Puller stood staring off over Carson’s shoulder.

“Should we report it?” she asked.

“We might do more harm than good if the kids are okay. They might end up getting deported.”

“Better than being dead, John.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“We can ask around. Maybe someone has seen them.”

“That’s a good idea. Diego has some friends around here. They might know something.”

It took them twenty minutes to locate two of Diego’s friends. The first had not seen Diego for two days. The second one had seen him yesterday.

“Was he with anyone?” asked Puller.

The boy held out his hand.

Puller put a five-dollar bill in it.

“Yes.”

“Who?” asked Carson.

The boy held out his hand again.

Carson put a dollar bill in it. The boy said nothing.

Puller said, “You tell us something useful there’ll be more. Otherwise, the ATM is shut down for the day.”

The boy looked around and said, “He is with the duenos de la calle.”

“The street kings?” said Puller.

“Yes. The street kings.”

“What is he doing with them?”

The boy held out his hand and Carson put another dollar bill in it.

“I think he is trying to join. If he is, he is stupid. They are a very bad gang.”

“What about Isabel and Mateo?” Puller asked. The boy withdrew his hand and put the cash in his pocket. He shrugged. “I do not know about them.”

“Where do we find the street kings?” asked Puller.

“You do not want to find the street kings, sewor,” said the boy.

“Actually, yes, I do. Where?”

Puller held out a twenty. “ Ahora !”

The boy gave them an address and then ran off.

Puller looked at Carson. “You don’t have to go with me.”

“The hell I don’t. This is just getting interesting.”

“You have any weapons?”

“You’re asking a one-star if she has any weapons? Other women might like shoes and nail polish. I grew up on Winchesters and Colts on a farm in Oklahoma. So I brought some goodies with me.”

“Okay. So we might want to gun up for this.” “Hell, John, I don’t think there’s any ‘might’

about it.”

The small shack sat behind an abandoned- looking building ten blocks off the water. It was in an area that would be discreetly described as in a transitional stage, meaning don’t go there at night and also try to avoid it during the day. The place looked dead and wasted and nothing like Paradise and its emerald beaches relatively close by. It seemed that the town’s beauty was only skin deep. A few layers under the surface it became quite ugly.

Three young men were standing outside the building and taking turns tossing knives at tin cans set atop a Dumpster. They were good enough that each one consistently knocked the cans over from a distance of ten feet.

“Decent aim.”

The men whirled, their hands dipping to the guns in their waistbands.

And then they stopped reaching for their guns.

Puller stood there holding an MP5 set on two- shot bursts. Carson had not been kidding about weapons. And flying on military transport had allowed her to bring whatever guns she wanted.

“Wise decision,” said Puller, coming forward and lifting his gaze past them and to the windows of the shack. They were covered and he saw no one trying to peek through to get a sightline on him with a weapon.

“Got a question.”

The men looked at him warily. Puller could tell they were trying to think of some way to turn his tactical advantage into a disadvantage.

But he wasn’t worried because the MP5 at close quarters was a difficult nut to crack.

“His name is Diego. He has two cousins. Isabel and Mateo. Where are they?”

The men said nothing.

Puller moved closer. “Diego, Isabel, and Mateo, where are they?”

The men remained silent.

Puller moved a foot closer. With one sweep of the MP he could lay all three down for eternity.

He shifted the fire selector on the MP to full auto. “I’ll ask one more time and then I won’t ask again.”

“We don’t know where they are,” said one of the men, staring at the muzzle of the MP.

“But you did know, right?”

The three men looked at one another. The man who had spoken shrugged. “Hard to say.”

“No, it’s really not. You just have to say it.”

Puller moved another foot closer.

The men smiled.

Puller thought he knew why.

“I wouldn’t,” said Puller. “I’m not the only one here.”

The men stopped smiling.

It was in the comer of Puller’s eye. A fourth man.

He’d come around the building’s east side. He had a slim compact pistol aimed at Puller’s head.

“Check your chest,” said Puller.

The man flinched, looked nervous, but didn’t look down, obviously suspecting a trick.

The other men glanced over. The one who had spoken swore under his breath as he saw the red dot squarely over the man’s heart.

He said something in Spanish. The man with the gun looked down, saw the dot. He swore too, lowered his gun.

Puller pointed his MP at him. “Why don’t you lose the gun and join the discussion group.”

It wasn’t a question.

The man dropped his gun and walked over to the others, the red dot following him the whole way.

“Diego and his cousins,” said Puller. “They were here and now they’re not. So where did they go?”

The four men glanced nervously at one another.

“Glancing and not talking tends to make me very angry,” said Puller. “And when I get angry I do unpredictable things.”

He put the fire selector back on two-shot bursts and fired some rounds above their heads. They all instinctively dropped to the dirt.

Puller eased his finger off the trigger and said, “Where?”

The men rose on trembling legs. One of them said, “They took them.”

One of the other men glared at him and looked ready to punch his colleague.

The speaker sensed this but hurried on. “They were taken last night. The man paid one thousand dollars for them both.”

“Both? Which both?”

“Los ninios. Diego y Mateo.”

“Who paid one thousand dollars?” Puller said sharply.

“Like I said, un hombre.”

Two of the other men hissed, but the speaker looked defiantly back at them.

Puller said, “What was his name? What did he look like?”

Before the other man could answer there was a roaring sound. Puller looked to his left and saw the pickup trucks coming. In the truck beds were men standing and holding a lot of firepower and looking ominously in Puller’s direction.

In Puller’s earwig Carson’s voice crackled. “I think retreat is the order of the day,” she said.

Puller grabbed the man who had answered him and they ran off.

The trucks veered off to give chase, but several shots rang out and both trucks ground to a halt with flattened tires. Two men fell out of one truck bed as it screeched to a stop.

Puller turned the corner with the man in tow and saw the Tahoe up ahead. He double-timed it and saw Carson coming down from her high perch on another building carrying her scoped rifle. She jumped into the passenger seat. Puller threw the man into the rear seat and leapt into the driver’s seat as he heard feet pounding down the road and men yelling in Spanish.